Improve My Business

I recently had a very productive call with a client - they wanted to let me know, mid-project, that they would like to see a few things changed.  I was happy to receive the call, and happy to commit to make the changes.  Happy to receive, because the client cared enough about the project and our professional relationship to make it and let me know what was less than perfect to date; and happy to commit to changes because my job, aside from the technical deliverables, is to listen to the client and respond when I can.

When I talked to my team about the changes, one of them took offense that I didn’t defend our actions more strongly, stand up for us more, etc.  He ranted and raved (literally) that the client was [also] in the wrong.  I don’t think he understood the purpose of the call.  The purpose of the call was to let us know how we could serve the client better.  It was NOT to place blame or defend our position.  Let’s look at a restaurant equivalent:

ME:  “Waiter, this soup is a bit cold…”

and the response we want (and what I hope I gave the client) was

WAITER: “Sir/Ma’am, I am so sorry about that - let me fix that right away!”

what my team member seemed to want me to say was

WAITER:  “Sir/Ma’am, you’re mistaken.  Our soup chef monitors the temperature of the soup with a calibrated thermometer and assures me that it was served at the correct temperature per the International Soup Federation’s guidelines.  If you were better educated on the ISF procedures, you’d know that you received it at the correct temperature and adjust your expectations accordingly.”

Now, while the waiter in the second scenario may be technically correct [and our waiter is welcome to privately think these thoughts all they want], his tip is going to be vanishing until he can paste a sincere-looking smile on his face and ’sell’ the first scenario.

Because sometimes, it’s not about being right; it’s about being heard as a customer.

Technorati Tags: customer service

I came across this great youtube video - when you watch it, notice the faces of the babies:

Technorati Tags: babies, humor, Streamlining, systems, systems thinking

When you find an error in your process or system, you should do an analysis of the reason you made that error.  Many times, you may find out that the reason that an error was made is that you don’t have a process - or that the process wasn’t followed (but that’ll be another post…)

So, if you don’t have a process - design one!

HOW do you design a process?  Easy peasy - map the process out.  How do you map a process?  Write down the steps that need to be done in order, try following those steps, then refine it until you’ve got it where  you want it.

Here’s an example:  we rent our Texas beach house out on VRBO and HomeAway. During this time of year, we get a LOT of requests for summer rentals.  The big risk is to rent the place twice for the same night(s) - double booking, so we want to make sure that we have a process in place.  Sure enough, we didn’t have our process in place, and ended up with a double booking this year; luckily, we caught it within an hour of accepting the second booking, so only had to apologize profusely and refund the deposit.  [It would've been MUCH worse if both families had shown up at the beach place expecting to stay for a week!]

So the problem remained - we had double booked.  How to revise our current process?

1. we stopped letting all folks take and make reservations - I am now the linchpin for the reservation process, and although others can check the account and answer queries, I’m the only one who accepts a deposit.
2. We track every reservation and deposit on a spreadsheet - and the process has to be followed in order.  So, a reservation has to be logged in and the calendar dates have to be blocked out before we deposit the money, as an example - to ensure that money isn’t accepted prior to verifying that the calendar is available.  The spreadsheet is sorted by date, so this should ensure that we don’t double-book.
3. Our double check for this is to make a copy of the check or credit card deposit, and to file those by dates  in a paper backup file.  [That's how we found out that we had double booked - the calendar hadn't been updated, but we had a deposit for that week already.]
4. Then, and only then, do we let our guests know that they have secured the reservation and continue the process.

We are hopeful that these tweaks will work for us, but are vigilant to identify possible ‘loopholes’ in the process, and plug them up. This is the essence of effective corrective action - monitoring to ensure that the process design is robust enough to prevent recurrence of the problem.

Have you had a problem, or made an error, and put a process in place to ‘fix’ it?  Post it here or contact me at marymcd@mcdcg.com - I’d love to hear about it!

Technorati Tags: beach home, process design, process improvement, process map

My local library not only has automated the checkout process (mounting a barcode gun for self-checkout) but also prints out a little slip of paper detailing the due dates for the books, and the amount of money saved, both today and for year-to-date.  The slip tells me that I’ve saved $368 to date in 2009 - presuming I’d buy hardcover books.

This subtle reminder of why I should continue to use the library got me to thinking - what have I done lately to remind my clients why they want to continue to work with me?  What can I do to keep that value front-and-center with them?

What can you do to keep your value proposition in front of your ideal client?

Technorati Tags: customer, value

Many folks are concerned about the state of the economy - locally, nationally, and internationally.  I see the same worries in some of my clients, but not in others; I’ve taken a closer look at these two groups of companies, and this is what I’m seeing (unscientific, but interesting nonetheless):

Worried companies — I’m defining worried companies as the ones who are not in good shape from a Quality standpoint.  Oh, their final product quality is fine; it’s the processes that could use some sprucing up.  Not sure if this sounds like your company or not:

• Your final quality product or service is fine; customers are overall happy.
• however, your company often is jumping through hoops to make this happen.  It sometimes takes extraordinary effort to deliver on time — overtime, extra work being done, or even hand-carrying the order through the line.

• When a change comes through, it requires a lot of special attention to be done ‘right’.  It’s not a normal occurrence, and really puts a strain on your organization.

• When a key person is absent (vacation or sick), the organization has trouble delivering with the same efficiency.

• Everyone spends time and energy determining who made the mistake, before asking why the mistake was made, or how to fix the mistake

By contrast, un-worried companies have a noticeably different set of situations:

• Your final quality product or service is fine; customers are overall happy.
• It’s no problem for your company to deliver top quality products and services; it’s routine for your organization.

• When overtime is needed, it’s done with the understanding that this is a temporary situation, and everyone pitches in.

• Absences, both planned and unplanned, barely cause a ripple in the smooth operations of the organization, as all critical work is documented, cross-trained, and backed up as appropriate.

• The organization is more concerned about fixing the problem than fixing the blame.

So, what are the steps that companies can take?

1. They can document the nebulous processes, review the existing processes, and ensure that critical steps in a process are documented and are correct.  (Documenting and leaving on a shelf to get dusty is a common, and useless, situation I see in some areas…sigh…)
2. They can use this time to tighten up their internal overall process flow once step #1 has been done — analyzing it for redundancies, streamlining, and ways to make it more efficient.  Do multiple areas in your organization do almost the same thing?  Are there more than one ‘right’ ways to do a certain process?  Can it be streamlined to deliver the output in less steps, or with lower defects?
3. They can spend this time to do training - formal training to bring up their employees’ skills; cross-training to ensure that absences are easier to handle; corporate knowledge transfer so when the guru goes on vacation or (gasp!) retires, the knowledge doesn’t walk out the door with him; management training to spruce up your managers’ interpersonal skills so they can handle the questions from nervous employees better; teamwork and teambuilding to let employees know that they are valued, and that working as a team is the best chance you have of staying in business; and a host of other training that I’m sure you can name immediately.

Interestingly, the client who are calling us are the ones that fall into the second group - they continue to focus on “business as usual”, streamlining, becoming more efficient, requesting training, delivering higher quality both internally and externally, etc.  The worriers?  Well, let’s just hope that they don’t lose my phone number as they run around with worried looks on their faces and gloom and doom in their hearts.

Technorati Tags: downturn, economics, efficiency, quality, Streamlining, training